


This Is A Work Of Fiction

by suburbanmotel



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blow Jobs, Boys Kissing, Derek Hale Deserves Nice Things, Derek Hale is Bad at Feelings, First Time, Getting Together, Hand Jobs, Idiots in Love, M/M, Mutual Pining, Oblivious Stiles, Pining, Resolved Sexual Tension, True Love, Unresolved Sexual Tension, derek is a writer, derek learns to use his words, yay!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-31
Updated: 2020-03-31
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:55:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23414914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suburbanmotel/pseuds/suburbanmotel
Summary: Stiles has a boyfriend. Stiles has a boyfriend who is not Derek. Derek doesn’t quite know how to handle this. He’s narrowed his options to a) Brooding b) Pining c) Glaring d) Declaring his devotion and unrequited love in hopes it may be somehow requited e) None of the above f) All of the above plus creating an alternate universe where he and Stiles are together forever.Not necessarily in that order.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Pining, Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski, Stiles Stilinski/OMC
Comments: 68
Kudos: 652





	This Is A Work Of Fiction

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bewarethesmirk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bewarethesmirk/gifts).



> Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
> 
> Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.

//

“Use your words, sweetheart,” his mother used to say when Derek glared and growled and bared his teeth, fighting with his siblings, fighting over bedtime or curfew, his favourite toy, his favourite treat. His first instinct was always physical, usually angry, generally unsuccessful in terms of a satisfactory outcome.

“Use your words, Derek,” his teachers would say when his classmates infuriated him and instead of calm discussion or even frenzied yelling, he’d tackle them to the floor, fangs barely contained, fists ready to pummel, eyes wild, half-shift right there, hovering.

“Use your words, dummy,” Laura would say, affectionately, mostly, when he wanted and wanted and _wanted_ and couldn’t get the words out right. He wanted to win their races, he wanted to be older, to be stronger. And when he finally was older and stronger, he just wanted his family back.

But before that, he wanted to be better than _everyone_. He just didn’t want to talk about it.

Laura would smile and sling an arm over his shoulder and squeeze tight and whisper right in his ear, “You’re half human, you know. You have to learn how to communicate with them. Even the stupid ones. Especially the stupid ones.” Then she’d kiss him and beat him on a foot race from the woods to the house.

Despite what people think, Derek _has_ tried to use his words over the years. He tried with his family, until they were almost all gone. He tries with Cora now, and sometimes it even works, when she’s not being deliberately difficult. He’s tried with his pack, with varying results, mostly not good. He’s tried with fellow wolves and annoying humans. The wolves understand his nonverbal clues, which he greatly appreciates. The humans? They’re dumb. No, he realizes, they’re not dumb. They’re much too clever for their own good. Their brains work differently, and their mouths move differently. They analyze. They look into things. They see beneath Derek’s skin and make assumptions, some of which are accurately, frighteningly true. Especially humans with big brown eyes and long expressive fingers that move in intricate patterns when they talk. Humans that Derek cannot get a good read on no matter how hard he tries.

Humans that use so many goddamn _words_.

//

Two weeks before Stiles is supposed to leave Beacon Hills, he and Derek are running for their lives through the Preserve for a change.

“I’m not supposed to be here!” Stiles half shouts. They’re hiding behind the trunk of a huge oak, waiting for Stiles to catch his breath, which is coming in hard, ragged gasps. He looks wild-eyed and scared and exhausted and pissed off. “I’m not supposed to be running from trolls! I’m supposed to be packing to leave! I’m supposed to be thinking about my new life in a new city far away from this shit show! I’m supposed to be having sweet dreams in my too small but mostly comfortable bed! I’m—”

And Derek _wants_.

Derek wants to stay here in these woods with this angry expressive Stiles. He wants to keep him close forever. He wants to tell him to shut the hell up and also never stop talking.

Derek wants to _kiss him._

This isn’t a new thought, he realizes, but it’s never been this strong, this overwhelming, this difficult to ignore. He wants to take Stiles’ long, lean body in his arms and put his mouth on him. Then he wants to tell Stiles things. He wants to tell him he thinks about him, a lot. Sometimes he masturbates to him. He wants to hold his hand and fall asleep with him at night. He wants to wake up with him in the morning and tell him about all the weird fucked up dreams he had the night before. He listens for trolls and listens for the pack and stares and stares at Stiles and thinks all these stupid, pointless thoughts as Stiles’ mouth still moves, his hands still gesticulate. He winds down eventually, like he does, and eyes Derek with grave mistrust.

“What?” he says. “What are you staring at?”

 _Now’s your chance_ , Derek thinks. _Use your words_ , Derek thinks.

“I,” he says. He stops. Where to start? Where exactly in his messed up rambling list of desires could he dive into? None of it makes any sense and Stiles is human so Derek can’t growl or bare his teeth or shift or emit any kind of scent that Stiles would be able to pick up on and just _know_ what Derek wants without Derek having to say a word at all.

Stiles frowns. His breathing has finally evened out but his cheeks remain a distracting shade of pink and his eyelashes are creating intriguing shadows high on his cheekbones. Derek swallows and tries again because Stiles hasn’t interrupted and seems to be waiting.

“You,” Derek says before his throat closes up. He closes his eyes and tries to envision what he wants to say, tries to somehow _will_ Stiles to understand words trapped in his head and unable to get free.

_You are beautiful and smart and fucking annoying and get on every one of my nerves and yet I can’t stop thinking about you your hands your face your neck your mouth I want to spend the rest of my life with you I think you’re the perfect match the perfect mate for me except you’re human and you literally do not understand a single thing I’m thinking right now_

Stiles expels a long breath. “Dude,” he says. He slumps back against the tree trunk, utterly spent. “Are you ok? You look like you’re about to have an aneurysm.” They sit like that together for a moment, listening to the forest sounds around them, the distant battle that the pack seems to be winning. They sit like that, not talking, until Scott crashes into the clearing and finds them and he and Stiles explode into a volley of words words words that Derek can barely comprehend so he just bares his fangs and growls and starts stomping away and Scott rolls his eyes and beckons for Stiles to follow.

Stiles does.

//

At the end of August Stiles goes off to university six hours away. He looks happy when he leaves and he looks happy when he comes home on weekends and holidays. Derek sees him when he comes back. He sees him at the house for pack night, and in town when he’s running errands and when he passes him on the road while running errands, Derek in the Toyota and Stiles in Roscoe, head bopping to whatever music he’s blasting, and he swears their eyes meet every single damn time, no matter where, no matter when. Each time Stiles looks caught, wide-eyed and startled, before the blush starts, high on his cheekbones and spreading down to the long planes of his neck. Each time Derek stares and blinks before he realizes he’s staring and his mouth has gone completely dry, devoid of spit.

He tries, valiantly, every single time Stiles comes home — seven times between September and the end of October — to articulate, to speak to _use his words_ about how he feels.

Instead, he ends up staring. Or glaring. Or pining. Silently berating his own ongoing inadequacy.

It’s hopeless. _He’s_ hopeless.

Erica takes pity on him and sets him up on a date with a friend of a friend, an accountant, a _nice guy_ who is _available_ and _his age_. She says these words without judgement, but Derek bristles and glowers just the same. She chooses his outfit and forces him to go and orders him to _have fun_. He goes and tries and comes back home, dejected, just as Scott is walking out the front door with Stiles.

“Hey Derek!” Scott says, too loud. “How was the date? Erica said he’s perfect for you!” His voice is just getting louder and Derek has a headache. He tries not to look at Stiles who hovers behind, face neutral, mouth flat.

“It was fine,” Derek says. It wasn’t fine. Greg was symmetrically attractive but bland and boring and _nice_ and the whole night was bland and boring and _nice_ and he wants to rip his outfit off and run naked through the woods. “Hi Stiles,” he adds because words matter, apparently.

Stiles nods at him but is oddly quiet and nudges at Scott to keep moving.

“Just heading to a house party, catching up with friends,” Scott says as they head down the porch stairs to Stiles’ waiting Jeep. “I’d invite you to come but—”

“It’s ok,” Derek says and for once he’s being honest. The thought of a house filled with loud music and hot bodies and _Stiles_ is just too much tonight, especially the Stiles part. “Have fun,” he adds as they clatter down the path, waving and calling good night. Well, Scott does. It’s not until much later when he’s lying face down in his bed, heavy with fatigue, that he realizes Stiles never said a single word at all.

//

“You need a hobby, Derek,” Erica says when Stiles goes back to school just before Halloween (Big party on campus can’t miss it! Stiles shouts as he hugs and slaps backs and high-fives and waves and drives away).

“A what,” Derek says as he refuses to watch Stiles’ car disappear down the road. His heart hurts. And his stomach. He wonders if he’s getting sick.

“Something fun to keep you distracted,” Erica says. She puts her hand on the middle of his back, soft and sure. It feels nice. He sighs.

“Something fun,” Derek says. He cannot for the life of him think of one fun thing he could do that would distract him from anything in his life ever.

“It’s important,” Erica says, patting his back like he’s a child. “And healthy.”

Derek nods but kind of dismisses her in the moment.

It sticks with him, though. It sticks with him when he’s working on the vehicles in the front yard. It sticks with him when the pack is practicing in the woods and when he can’t fall asleep at night. And it definitely sticks with him when Scott FaceTimes with Stiles in the living room, and when Stiles makes his whirlwind appearances, rushing in and out of Derek’s life like it doesn’t affect him in the least, but leaves Derek winded and weak in his wake.

 _Find a hobby_ , Erica had said. _Something fun._

 _Baking is fun_ , Boyd had said. 

_So is masturbation_ , Isaac had offered. _And cheaper._

Derek sits in front of his computer and starts scrolling aimlessly. He tries to think of something, anything that interests him. He likes cars and he likes fixing things, but he can already do those things. They’re easy and not always distracting. He thinks of all the things he can’t do, the things he struggles with. It’s a long, depressing list. He types in the name of the local community college and tries to envision himself sitting in a classroom full of students the same age as Stiles. He shakes his head and almost gives up entirely when he finds it. Online Fiction Workshop. Eight weeks, eight assignments.

_This online class for beginners offers quality instruction and, as much as possible, replicates the experience of being in a classroom with a teacher and fellow students. The classes do not take place in “real time,” and you can participate in class any time, day or night. Classes advance week-by-week, and certain things should be accomplished within that seven-day time period. This course gives you a firm grounding in the basics of fiction craft and gets you writing a short story (or two) with video lectures, writing exercises and feedback._

Derek sits there, head and heart pounding, mouth dry. He thinks about pale skin and moles and bright brown eyes and the impossibility of it all and all the things he wants to say and can’t.

Fiction writing. For beginners.

 _Use your words_ , he thinks.

He fills in the form, he pays, he presses send.

//

_i) Context — The introduction to your story. You’re bringing out your characters, setting up the seeds of conflict, and imparting just enough background information to keep the reader clued in on what’s occurring in the story._

Characters: A boy. Another boy. Some other characters who don’t really matter because they’re mostly annoying.

Setting: A house. Some woods. A ~~Jeep~~ vehicle of no particular description. It’s blue. Maybe.

Marjory, the instructor, is calm but expressive in her video tutorials. She lays out the lesson plans and the assignments, discusses what she expects from the students and how to contact her with any questions. She’s warm and encouraging. Non-judgmental, Derek thinks. Or hopes. He really hopes she’s not homophobic because his stories are very gay, the stories he needs to tell.

He tries writing on his laptop but the sight of the blank screen, the blinking cursor, the expectation of failure, does something weird to his brain and he starts sweating and his fingers twitch. He’s also not a fast or accurate typist, so he decides to save typing for after he’s actually composed something. Less pressure, less stress.

So he buys a pack of notebooks and a package of pencils and sits in the park on a warm autumn afternoon while children scream at the park and the sky is blue and the leaves have just started to change. He writes about a boy. He writes about a boy with bright brown eyes that don’t miss a thing and a boy with brown hair that looks soft but is surprisingly coarse to the touch. He writes about long, rangy limbs that are, in turns, clumsy and amazingly coordinated. The sun is warm on his shoulders and he likes the sound the pencil makes on the paper. He likes the air on his face and he likes the fact that he can pack up his notebook and pencil and move wherever he wants. He writes in his car and he writes in his bed. Whenever the mood strikes him, he sits down and scribbles out some words and hides it quickly whenever someone asks what the hell he’s doing.

“Writing to Santa?” Isaac asks.

“Leave him alone,” says Erica, who knows exactly what he’s doing and is so proud she could burst.

“I’m so proud I could burst,” she’d said when he told her what he was doing.

“Yeah, yeah,” he said. The back of his neck was hot.

“I am, Derek. This is really mature. Really healthy.”

“Uh huh,” Derek mumbled.

He’s thinking of his assignment, due that night, a scene based on real life. Marjory likes detail, she says in her lesson plan. And honesty. Details and honesty.

_The boy doesn’t know ~~Derek~~ David wants him and maybe even loves him, because words are hard for David. David, however, notices everything about the boy, like how his smile curls up at the corners, and the exact pattern of his moles and the exact colour of his eyes. David wishes he was quick and clever with words the way the boy is, but he’s not, and he probably never will be, so he can only admire from afar, and wonder what the boy’s lips taste like, hopes he can find out before it’s too late._

Derek sits at the kitchen table late into the night, pencil and paper and coffee, mind whirling, fingers cramping, words words words filling page after page after page.

//

_This one is very good,_ Marjory comments on one assignment.

 _You’re getting better each time_ , Marjory says about the next one. _Very expressive, more emotional._

 _I like your use of imagery here,_ she writes. _Comparing the boy to a missing limb may be a bit dramatic, but I think it works in this instance._

 _The longing is palpable here,_ says Marjory. _It’s sweet but painful, too. It really hurts_ , and Derek thinks yes. Yes it does.

//

_ii) Conflict — What’s a good story without a few (or more) wrinkles? The rising action is prompted by a key trigger or event that rolls the dice and causes a series of events to escalate, setting the rest of the story in motion._

A week before Thanksgiving Stiles comes traipsing into the house and he’s not alone. There’s another boy behind him, hovering, nervous, smiling but unsure. He’s tall, taller than Stiles, dark almost black hair and a square chin. He looks at everyone in the room as everyone looks back at him, polite but questioning. He looks at Derek who stares right back, unblinking. Derek’s stomach feels queasy.

“Hey everyone,” Stiles says to the room at large. He looks. Well, he looks gorgeous, Derek thinks. Taller than Derek remembers, and leaner but more muscled as well. Like he’s been eating well and sleeping well and working out. “I miss anything?”

“Derek has a diary,” Isaac says from his spot in front of the television. Derek’s head snaps up at the same time Stiles’ head snaps in his direction.

“It’s _not_ a diary,” Erica says from across the room in a tone of voice that implies she’s said the exact same thing several times before.

“How do _you_ know?” Isaac says.

“Because I’m Derek’s _friend_ ,” Erica says. “And he actually confides in me. Because I’m not an _asshole_.”

Everyone falls silent again. New boy shuffles nervously as Stiles continues to look at Derek.

“Who the hell is that?” Derek says because no one else is talking. There. Who says Derek doesn’t use his words? He uses words just fucking fine, thank you very much.

“I think he means, who’s your friend, Stiles?” Erica asks, voice sweet, glaring at Derek.

“Uh, this is. Uh. My uh.”

“Derrick,” the boy says. “Boyfriend. Hi.”

There is dead silence. Then Erica starts laughing. Hysterically.

“Are you fucking serious?” She looks at the boy. “No offense.”

Derrick shrugs, like he was expecting it.

“Yes, his name is actually Derrick,” Stiles announces to the room at large. His face has turned an alarming shade of red and Derek — not the Derrick Stiles is actually dating — can see sweat forming along his hairline. He can also smell Stiles’ sweat, mixed in with a whole host of other emotions. “We met at the Halloween party. I was dressed as a vampire and he was. Well he was uh.”

“A werewolf,” Derrick supplies.

“Oh dear god,” says Erica. She puts a hand over her mouth.

Derrick looks confused, and Derek almost feels sorry for him, but not really. Not at all.

“Is that…funny?” Derrick says.

“Not in the least,” Derek mutters.

Derrick slings an arm over Stiles’ broad shoulders. Derek growls and curls his nails into his palms. Isaac narrows his eyes at him.

“Well, that’s great,” Boyd says, who seems to think that story is the exact opposite of great. “Did you know about this, Scott?”

Scott blinks. Of course he knew, Derek thinks. Asshole. “Well, Stiles did mention he’d met someone, but he didn’t go into great detail or anything.”

“Regardless, it’s cool. We’re cool and I’m sure you’re cool, or you wouldn’t be. Like.” Erica stops.

“Dating,” Derrick supplies.

Derek growls again. He has no words for how he’s feeling. Irritation, he thinks. Also, aggravation. Anger. Rage. Rage is a good one.

Derek’s been making good use of the thesaurus in his Fiction for Beginners course.

But once Derek gets over his initial shock he starts to feel a whole host of other less pleasant emotions that he has no idea how to deal with. Emotions like confusion and disappointment. And deeper down, a churning desperate jealousy that feels like acid in his gut.

He spends the weekend avoiding Stiles and Derrick and pretty much everyone else. He runs in the woods for hours and returns sweaty and more winded than he’s been in years. He cleans each pack member’s car inside and out, changes the oil, replaces sparkplugs. He keeps his eyes averted and doesn’t speak. He tells himself stories in his head while he scrubs every bathroom in the house and writes them down late at night in his bed by the light of his bedside table.

_~~The boy~~ Sam loved someone else which didn’t surprise David, because Sam was beautiful and vibrant and alive and deserved every good thing in the world. But it broke David’s heart all the same, but instead of telling Sam, David did what he always did, which was run away and continue to fuck everything up._

When Stiles and Derrick stop by on Sunday to say goodbye, Derek hefts the axe in his hands and brings it down as hard as he can, splitting the 17th log of the day into oblivion.

//

Everything is coming unraveled, Derek thinks. The story isn’t supposed to end this way. This isn’t how any of this is supposed to end.

Stiles comes back, he _keeps coming back_ , once with and once without Derrick and Derek pours his heart out onto the page, working his favourite pencil down to the nub, frantically sharpening another and a third notebook.

 _You’re certainly fulfilling all the assignment requirements!_ writes Marjory. _You might want to, at some point, joining all these stories together into a novel. There’s a lot of good material here. Lots of angst and conflict!_

No fucking kidding, Derek thinks. Conflict fucking _sucks_.

 _David might love Sam, if he let himself, if he let his heart feel anything that intensely. But, instead of telling Sam, like a coward David just writes it all down. “I don’t know what to do with all these_ feelings _,” David says with a disgust generally reserved for a termite infestation or genital herpes._

He submits a short story in between actual assignments because he can’t stop writing and he has no one else to show his work to.

_I like this one! What do you think would happen, though, if David told Sam how he felt? How do you think it might affect the outcome of your next story? What’s keeping David from talking to Sam?_

Derek actually laughs out loud when he reads that and holds his head in his hands for awhile.

Well, the world would fucking end, for starters. After that, it’s anyone’s guess.

He runs for an hour, blind and numb, and stumbles into the house to find his worst nightmare come to life. Stiles standing in the living room holding what looks like Derek’s latest notebook in his hand. He’s staring down at it, mouth slightly open, dim afternoon light outlining his unmistakable profile. He looks like an angel. Derek stops breathing.

“You,” he says.

Stiles looks up. He doesn’t look guilty, like a normal person would. He looks _angry_. He looks _disappointed_. He looks _betrayed_.

“You could try just talking to me, you know,” is what Stiles says, instead of _Sorry I’m a fucking nosy jackass who thinks you doesn’t understand the concept of privacy or asking persmission._

Derek leaps across the room like a gazelle, eyes wide, panicked sweat prickling his scalp.

“Disclaimer!” he shouts, inexplicably, near hysteria pitching his voice too high. Derek jabs a finger in the direction of the notebook. “Disclaimer! Goddamn fucking disclaimer! Names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals! Read the fucking disclaimer!” He finishes his strange rant in a hiss.

Stiles closes the book and takes a deep breath.

“I didn’t think.” Stiles starts. Derek looks at him. “l didn’t know.”

“Know what?” Derek holds himself very still, arms over his chest.

“You never talk to me. I didn’t _know_.”

“What are you talking about?”

Stiles shakes the book. Now he looks like he might cry.

“This! I didn’t know about any of this! You never say anything! I thought I was the only—” He stops short.

“I didn’t say anything, Stiles, because there’s nothing to say,” Derek makes his voice as hard and cold as possible, which isn’t difficult because he can’t remember the last time he was this fucking pissed. “I made it all up. All of it. None of it is true.”

“Ok,” Stiles says slowly. “Ok. Got it.”

He hands Derek the notebook, turns around, and shuts the door behind him.

All those words, Derek thinks. He knew they’d be nothing but trouble.

//

Stiles leaves without saying goodbye, and doesn’t return for two months.

//

_iii) Climax — Both moment of truth for the protagonist and the event to which the plot’s built up. When the outer and inner journeys come together and click, you know you’ve got the beginnings of a winning climax._

In March the cold weather breaks and Stiles comes home alone. Derek is working in the garage, cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, always cleaning these days, when he looks up and sees that long figure leaning against the doorway. He’s wearing a navy pea coat and a beanie and a somber expression. His hair is all mashed down under his hat and his hands are jammed into his pockets. He’s just standing there watching Derek and Derek suddenly realizes he has no idea how long he’s been standing there. 

“Hey,” he says, raising one grease-stained hand. Stiles just nods. His eyes are still dark and wary, his hands still curled into fists in his pockets. “You’re back.” 

“Yeah,” Stiles says because he is. Words are so fucking stupid, Derek thinks. So many things he wants to say and none of them are the right ones. 

“Alone this time?” Derek can’t help himself. Every time he opens his mouth words come out and not the right ones. 

Stiles nods. “We broke up. Other Derrick and me.” He stops there and Derek supposes he deserves that, the non-explanation. It’s really none of his business after all. He and Stiles don’t owe each other anything. The stories are fiction and Stiles owes him nothing. 

“Oh,” Derek says anyway. “I’m sorry.” 

Stiles snorts. “Are you.” 

“Well.” Derek looks at his fingernails. “Are _you_ sorry?” 

Stiles purses those lips and looks away. Derek really needs to clean under his nails, Jesus. 

“No,” Stiles says finally. “Not sorry.” 

“Ok,” Derek says. _Good_ , he thinks. 

Derek chances a look at Stiles, because Stiles is looking away, out into the windswept, early spring yard, muddy and bare and he shivers, because it’s damp, even in his heavy coat and dumb pretty hat. 

“You want to come inside?” Derek says. Stiles looks at him. “Let’s go inside.” 

Derek busies himself putting the kettle on for tea or coffee or whatever hot drink Stiles might want. He might not want anything at all, but Derek doesn’t know because he hasn’t asked. It gives him something useful to do, filling the kettle and turning on the burner and reaching up to get two mugs down from the cupboard. He’s rummaging in the drawer for tea — there are about 214 different varieties lines up neatly because Isaac — and he’s just about to ask, to use his words, when Stiles speaks. 

“What do you want, Derek?” Stiles asks. His coat, heavy and dark, is slung across the back of the chair. His beanie is sitting too high on his head and it looks stupid, perched there on Stiles’ dark, thick hair. Derek wants. Derek _wants_. Stiles moves closer. He’s wearing a white T-shirt under a loose red plaid flannel shirt, just like he’s always dressed, but he’s different. He looks different. He moves different. Derek wonders if he and Derrick fucked or not. No, he can’t think about that. Did they kiss? Of course they did. Jesus. He closes his eyes, breathes in deeply through his nose and holds it. When he opens his eyes Stiles is standing right in front of him, close enough to touch. That fucking beanie, sitting there. And Derek _wants._

“What, Derek?” Stiles says. His voice is low and quiet, questioning, like he really wants to know. 

Derek opens his mouth. He reaches up, slowly, touches Stiles’ cheek, the wisps of hair curling there, curling out from under the hat. He pulls it off, lets it fall. Stiles’ hair is half flat and half springy, dark and soft under Derek’s fingers. Stiles’ eyes never leave Derek’s face. 

“Use your words, Derek,” he whispers. 

“Ok,” Derek nods. “Ok then.” He looks right at Stiles, doesn’t look away. “I want you.” 

// 

He lays Stiles out on his bed and stares down at him, at his long arms and legs, his T-shirt and plaid, his worn jeans and white socks with the hole in one toe. The right foot. A hole in the right toe. The light from Derek’s window makes Stiles’ features look harsher than they are. But Stiles isn’t as soft as he once was, Derek realizes with a start. Stiles has changed in the past six months. But, Derek has too. 

_The boy was beautiful, but more than that, he was familiar. He was Derek’s past, he was Derek’s memory but his present, too, and maybe, if Derek was lucky, he was his future. He smelled like the woods behind Derek’s house, and the stream that ran through it in the spring, still icy cold and smelling like snow. In this weather his skin was pale with spots of colour on his cheeks, on his chin, across his shoulder blades, spreading down the front of his chest. He was everything Derek wanted but was afraid to ask for. Derek didn’t think he deserved anything, not really, not for keeps._

Stiles’ chest is rising and falling sharply and he swallows twice with effort. 

Derek kneels on the bed, knees on either side of Stiles’ thighs, hands braced beside Stiles’ wide shoulders. He considers Stiles, his pale flushed skin and half smushed hair and parted lips. He smells stale, like the inside of the Jeep, and hours of travel. He smells tired and wired and nervous. And under all that, he smells wildly, electrically aroused. He’s hard, Derek knows, he knows it without touching Stiles, because he can scent it and he can see the way Stiles holds himself and shifts minutely under Derek’s steady gaze. 

“You want words?” Derek leans down, close enough for his lips to brush the fine skin by Stiles’ ear, close enough to breathe out across Stiles’ neck, to breathe in shampoo and musk and Stiles . “I think you’re beautiful,” Derek says. “You’re bright and sharp and funny and you know me better than anyone else. I want you here with me, in my bed, in my life and I don’t want to be anywhere else with anyone else.” He presses his lips to Stiles’ cheek, his forehead, his left eyelid, his neck, the skin just below the collar of his shirt. “The things I want to do to you. I guess I could use words, but I’d rather just show you.” 

He pulls back. Stiles licks his lips and nods, his breath hitching painfully. 

Derek takes his time, even though every cell in his body is screaming hurry, hurry, this isn’t forever, he’s not yours, he’s not here for long. He forces himself, orders himself to go slowly, slowly as his drags undresses Stiles, pulls his layers off until he’s bare and pale and shivering again, but his skin under Derek’s fingers is hot. He drags his fingers and tongue over Stiles’ neck and shoulders, down his arms to the palms of his hands. He kisses his mouth, hot and heavy and sweet, then kisses down the front of his chest, stroking his cock before taking him in his mouth. Stiles is trembling, he realizes, but he thinks he may be shaking harder than Stiles. He focuses on the feeling of Stiles in his mouth, memorizes the sounds Stiles makes high in his throat, how his long fingers grasp at Derek’s sheets and Derek’s shoulders. When he comes his right knee bends and he twists to the side with a shout. Derek watches it all and thinks about how he might write it all down later, but not for Marjory. These words are private. Just for him. 

Especially when Stiles pulls him down and kisses and kisses him, and undoes his jeans and reaches in, stroking him while they pant into each other’s mouths hot and heavy and Derek comes silently, Stiles swallowing his breath and voice and any syllable, any word he might have said is gone, all buried deep down inside Stiles. 

// 

_iv) Closure — What goes up must come down. Your characters shouldn’t stop moving just because you’ve checked off the climax. Usually, this is the stage where authors start resolving any remaining subplots and mini-conflicts, where everyone merrily pairs off with the right partner and any and all dangling threads are tied up._

“I’ll be home in a few weeks for summer,” Stiles says. He’s flat on his back staring at the ceiling. There’s sweat pooled in the hollow of his throat between his sharp collar bones. He’s lost weight, Derek thinks, since Christmas. He’s pale and stretched thin like snow. “You gonna wait for me?” 

Derek blinks. Wait? Where else would he go? Who else would he go to? 

He rolls on his side, resting his damp heavy head on his arm. He looks at Stiles’ profile, the gentle upturn of his nose, the peak of his lips, the soft slope beneath his chin down his long neck. 

_Mine,_ Derek thinks. 

Stiles rolls on his side to face Derek, his eyes big and dark and searching. “Derek?” 

“You,” Derek starts. Words, he thinks, mess everything up. Millions of words in the world and none of them adequate for what he wants to say right now. “You’re everything. What I wrote in the notebook, what you read, that’s all real. All of it. It was easier to write it down, but it’s still not close to what I feel.” He reaches out and touches that hollow, still gleaming, then up to the side of Stiles’ neck where he can feel his heartbeat, steady, present. “So yes. I’ll wait for you. I’ve been waiting for you. I’ll keep waiting for you.” 

Stiles smiles. His eyes are wet and he blinks fast. 

“Good,” he says. “And maybe. If you feel like it, I mean. I could read some more. Of the stories.” His finger pick at the sheet between them. “It that’s ok.” 

Derek considers. “Maybe,” he says. “And maybe I could just tell you, too.” 

// 

Derek submits his final story the week after Stiles returns to school. It’s rated PG, for the most part, nothing explicit, nothing embarrassing, nothing _private_. It’s hopeful, if he’s being honest. It’s hopeful and kind of funny and _sweet_. It’s about touches and kisses and the future. It’s about using words, maybe not the right ones, but the best ones, for Derek. 

__This is excellent, Derek. You’ve come a long way in this course. It’s been a pleasure to teach you. Please keep writing. The world needs your words. Also, I’m so glad your protagonists got their happy ending. While there’s nothing wrong with a sad finale if it fits the narrative, I definitely think happy works better in this case._ _

Derek agrees. 

_//_

_v) Conclusion — And after all that? Well, you’ve made it to the denouement. Everywhere, readers breathe a collective sigh of relief. Also called the resolution, the denouement is just a fancy way of saying that the book is now going to wrap up._

Summer has never been his favourite season. Too hot, too humid, too long. Too itchy under his skin, his fur. Shifting is more difficult, more labour intensive. He’s always been too busy, in summers past, keeping everyone else busy, keeping them in line, finding a schedule that works for them after nine months of school or full-time jobs. Summer is usually dreaded, something to get through, point A to point B. 

This summer is different. This summer he has writing and he has a boyfriend. He’s _happy_ and he does unusual things because of it. 

He buys more notebooks and more pencils, more than he needs but it’s become a compulsion. He buys beer for the pack. He buys a _swing_ for the _porch_. 

He shares his bed more nights than not and words fall from his fingers and his lips and Stiles soaks it all in and gives it all back without judgement. 

_//_

“So how does this story end?” Stiles asks. They’re on the porch, swinging back and forth. It’s August, hot and still. Stiles leaves for school in two weeks. Derek will miss his horribly but it’s ok. He’ll write and Stiles will write back and when they see each other, it will be like they were never apart. It’s a love story, after all. He leans down and kisses Stiles softly, sweetly, just his lips, a touch of tongue, the barest brush of teeth. Derek closes his eyes. 

“Happily,” says Derek. 

“Good,” Stiles says. 

_And the boy, Stiles was his name, tumbled into Derek’s life and his bed and stayed there because he wanted to, and learned to talk to each other and work things out even when Stiles, in particular, was really annoying, Derek loved him anyway. And Stiles loved him back._

Derek kisses him again, and again, thinks about a story waiting in his brain about two idiots in love and their long, winding path from there to here. 

_Please keep writing. The world needs your words._

He has a few stories left in him, he thinks.

//


End file.
